Some Infrequently Asked friggin’ Questions! Part, like, five and a half, depending on how you count the announcement of last week’s giveaway winners! Click the “Shameless Self Promotion” category on the left sidebar to see the other entries from the series, if you’re so inclined.
From Jenn D.:
As a California born, East Coast transplant myself, I’d love to know what 3 things you miss the most about California life.
- The weather. The weather the weather the weather. Call me an elitist West-Coast weather snob, but I have a little rule: if people in your hometown have to argue about which is worse, the summers or the winters, then maybe you should get a new hometown. (Personally, this desert rat can’t handle rain or extreme humidity. I don’t hate the snow, though.)
- Amazing produce. Can’t beat a Northern California farmer’s market, complete with vegan spinach naan wraps, milk so fresh it’s sold unpasteurized, and champagne mangoes picked that very morning. ALL! YEAR! LONG!
- People flying their dang freak flags. This might be Bay Area specific, but I love being able to go into San Francisco and see steampunks, anarchists, feminist goths, and super-fabulous transsexuals — all just, y’know, in their pajamas at the grocery store. Lots of the New England girls I’ve met are lovely creatures, but wear lots of fabrics with fussy little prints and never accidentally talk about sex dolls at job interviews and, y’know, actually care what people think about them. These are fine qualities, but I sometimes get sick of feeling like an incurable outsider.
Oh, and how do you feel about toe socks?
I live my life by an aggressively anti-sock agenda. Part of the rabid flipflop devotion.
From allypanda:
At the end of all this, do you feel like you don’t really like the girl you were before? Or have any regrets for living as you did before? Or is life all one big self improvement changing experience?
As thrilled as I am with the girl I’m rapidly becoming, I have no regrets or negative feelings for the life I led before. At the risk of sounding like a total doucher, I’m one of those people with a rare and annoying imperviousness to insecurity. Doubt, yes; angst, undoubtedly; but, not even too far from the surface, I love myself so much you can see it from space and have for many, many years — even at times when you would have had to be crazy to find much to love about me.
That said, I’ve never in my life felt so comfortable with other people. And every time I successfully test my limits or remind myself how much there is to adore about other people, I give myself more to love. If I could keep NTKOG-ing ’til the day I die — and what’s stopping me? — I think I’d be the happiest old crone ever lowered into this earth.
From Michael:
If you had grown up in England (God save the queen!), what would you say instead of dude?
Hmmm, “bloke” would serve well when I’m using “dude” to refer to dudes in the existential capacity of, y’know, dudeness, but what would be my ubiquitous go-to interjection?! I can’t tell you that, but what I can tell you is that a tired and distracted search for alternative slang interjections just led to me accidentally googling “British ejaculations”. At work. In front of my boss.
What’s the most unadventurous TKOG thing you do in your everyday life that makes you proud?
Most of the long-lasting NTKOG effects on my life are definitely subtle. The biggest one to me is that now I listen to more music in a single day than I used to in an entire month. And I’m being so literal when I say that. Now that I listen to 12-14 hours of music a day, it’s hard to believe that listening to music was once an NTKOG — but until a few months ago, I only had twelve songs in my iTunes library!
Other non-heroic changes that have made my life fuller and more beautiful: sending work out to literary journals (do it a few times a week); asking store-keepers for discounts for literally no reason (everyday occurrence now); having lengthy conversations with homeless people (multi-weekly). Plus, at least a few times a day, if I want something? I just ask someone. It usually works out well.
Is there a shameful secret weighing heavy on your mind that you’d like to share with your loyal blog readers?
There actually is, but I’m still working up the courage. It’s the answer to another “Ask Me Anything” question, though, so rest assured you’ll find out. For now, a bonus secret that I think a few readers don’t know: have you ever noticed the mouse-over text on every picture I post on here? It’s often my favorite line or two from any given entry!
From Dave:
If you won two matching $5.00 gift cards from a noted online book store, would you buy Wodehouse or Waugh (assuming quite correctly that you owned neither, but decided to give one of them a shot; Because after all it was costing you almost nothing)?
Oh my goodness, can we please talk about Wodehouse and Waugh? (“In fact, TKOG, it seems you can scarcely talk about anything else.”) They were contemporaneous — in fact, for a while they played on a cricket team with JM Barrie — and both of their oeuvres stand as the best existing studies of upper-crust British society (and its slang!) in the inter-war period. They’re also both laugh-out-loud funny and feature characters with bizarre names. These are some pretty big similarities, right?
The big difference: Wodehouse’s writing is light, drawing-room farce; Waugh’s early works are social satires so brutal they will singe your friggin’ skin. Which brings to my mind the excellent aphorism I once heard regarding the difference between comedy and satire: Comedy is light-hearted, but pessimistic; satire is mean-spirited, but still believes in change.
Anyway, I highly recommend both, but will always be a Wodehouse girl. And I’ll admit, I stay away from Waugh’s Very Serious Catholic Latter Works (including That Really Famous One).
From douchegirl (and several others via comment, tweet, and email):
Were you featured in the July issue of [a national magazine]?
Yes! It was! It was totally me! Sorry for editing all your comments, but I don’t want to go public with which magazine because I’m still attempting anonymity here. Also, I can’t BELIEVE how many of you recognized me! I don’t know whether that says more about me or about you…
From Erin, at The Fierce Beagle:
I’ll start with the obvious question: Are you, and also the folks you regularly feature in your tales, actually real human beings? And not, like, some 56-year-old dude coming up with all this while he’s supposed to be running spreadsheets at work?
Dude! Way to blow my big project reveal two months early! At least now I’ll save the cash and hassle of hiring a bunch of 20-something actors for the big blog wrap party in August. They totally wouldn’t have waded through all these dang archives to figure out their characters anyway.
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I’ll see you tomorrow, possums! And for those of you who wished Nich a happy birthday yesterday, on here or on Twitter, many thanks and peanuts!
{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
OK, well NOW I want to know what magazine you were in! (as a writer, I assume?) Come on, any hints?
It wasn’t as a writer, alas. It was as a vaguely literary alcoholic.
I’m sure that’s wrong; more like a literary vaguely alcoholic? ;-)
While that’s my usual state, in this particular one-sentence quote, the emphases were reversed.
Oh thank heavens! I’ve been biting my nails waiting for this response. I thought I was the only one who recognized you and it creeped you out.
That Wodehouse answer completely gave you away.
haha, no, I wasn’t creeped out at all. I was more impressed with you guys than anything! That, and I realized I might need to become a little less predictable in my interests. Actually, I was kind of surprised to go through and see that I hadn’t acknowledged this anywhere. I have an NTKOG in the works about how I ended up in said magazine — I should probably star that on my to-write list!
“That said, I’ve never in my life felt so comfortable with other people. And every time I successfully test my limits or remind myself how much there is to adore about other people, I give myself more to love. If I could keep NTKOG-ing ’til the day I die — and what’s stopping me? — I think I’d be the happiest old crone ever lowered into this earth.”
Rock on! I wish I could make this the (extremely long) banner headline for every high school newspaper in the country – you just gave coughed up some wisdom there.
When did you accidentally talk about a sex doll on a job interview? I want details!
Not only did I talk about sex dolls, but it was at an interview to teach impressionable youths in a charter high school. Yeah, I’m aces.
Have you/will you do a blog post on that? I’d like to read about that for sure.
One of the ideas I’m playing with for after I finish my TKOG year (less than two months!!!) is dragging out some stories from the vault. When I do, I’ll rocket that one to the top of my list!
Dear, ah, with a 5 buck gift certificate you might choose Wodehouse, Waugh or a double Archie comic book.
Yes! I always read those mouse-over lines and love them!